https://www.smithsonianmag.com/rss/blog/national-museum-american-history/RSS feed for National Museum of American HistoryenTue, 08 Oct 2024 18:54:14 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/10/08/how-a-newspaper-revolution-sparked-protesters-and-influencers-disinformation-and-the-civil-war/How the most divided period in the history of U.S. democracy – the mid-1800s – coincided with a sudden boom in new communications technologies, confrontational political influencers, widespread disinformation, and nasty fights over free speech. This media landscape helped bring about the Civil War.Tue, 08 Oct 2024 18:54:14 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/10/04/bernice-johnson-reagons-lessons-for-living/Bernice Johnson Reagon’s life offers us lessons to navigate an unjust world and work toward change. From her role as a Civil Rights activist to her transformative curatorial position at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, Reagon demonstrated how songs and musical traditions, particularly those of the oppressed and marginalized, can transform the world.Fri, 04 Oct 2024 12:35:33 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/09/23/whats-happening-in-october-food-history-weekend-and-more/Here's what's happening this month at the National Museum of American HistoryMon, 23 Sep 2024 15:32:25 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/09/23/to-american-revolutionaries-patriotism-meant-fair-dealing-with-one-another/When modern Americans call themselves patriots, they are evoking a sentiment that is 250 years old.Mon, 23 Sep 2024 14:55:39 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/09/16/smithsonian-artifacts-reveal-the-historical-significance-of-presidential-debates/Bobbleheads, Magic 8 Balls, chairs and other artifacts in the Smithsonian reveal the historical significance of presidential debates.Mon, 16 Sep 2024 14:38:36 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/08/29/the-2024-political-conventions-find-a-home-in-the-smithsonian-collections/The cheering, clapping and speechifying are over. Historians from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History have returned after their trips to the 2024 political party conventions to collect materials – from balloons to banners to blinking wristbands – at each of them.Thu, 29 Aug 2024 18:08:40 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/08/26/whats-happening-in-september-events-exhibits-and-more/Here’s what’s happening this month at the National Museum of American HistoryMon, 26 Aug 2024 16:35:17 +0000https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-american-history/2024/08/26/smithsonian-curators-encounters-at-the-democratic-national-convention/At the 2024 Democratic National Convention alongside politicians and delegates from across the country are political history curators from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, who are collecting what museum curators call “ephemera” – items that people wear, carry, hand out, display or otherwise use during the convention.Mon, 26 Aug 2024 12:56:30 +0000